Saturday, April 25, 2015

Secretary General Ban Ki-moon convened a meeting in the UN headquarters on Myanmar on Friday,
April 24, 2015. In his speech to the participants
of the Partnership Group for Peace, Development and Democracy in Myanmar, Mr. Ban warned
Myanmar
that stability in its most sensitive region can’t be achieved unless it
addresses the issue of citizenship for minority Rohingya Muslims. He told a Myanmar
delegation that the U.N. has seen “already troubling signs of ethnic and
religious differences being exploited” as elections approach later this year.

Speaking at the meeting, India’s permanent representative to the UN,
Asoke Kumar Mukerji noted that in RakhineState, the Myanmar
Government "has taken steps towards restoration of law and order and has
expressed readiness to cooperate with UN and other humanitarian agencies
regarding rehabilitation of those affected by violence." "We urged
member states to agree to the discontinuation of annual resolutions on the
human rights situation in Myanmar,"
Mukerji said. "In our view, this would convey the world community's strong
support and encouragement for the reform measures that are already underway in Myanmar."

While disappointed to hear the statement from the
Indian rep, I am not too surprised. After all, India has her own ‘Rohingya problem’
in Jammu & Kashmir, where people have been denied their basic human rights.
The Government of India has not allowed a UN sponsored plebiscite - long
demanded not only by its own people but also the world community as reflected
in UN Resolutions dating back to 1948.

Much like the Burmese leaders of our time, the Indian
leaders have repeatedly told the world community that the Kashmir problem is an
internal affair which India
will solve internally without outside interference. India
has not done anything in the last 68 years since her independence in 1947 from Britain to
solving the problem. It was a hypocritical gesture to derailing the world
opinion and ignoring human rights of the affected Kashmiris. Since 1989 when
serious insurgency began, at least 80,000 Kashmiris (mostly civilians) have
been killed by the Indian forces. The Indian Occupied Kashmir remains a police
state with one soldier for every 10 Kashmiris living in the valley. These
Indian troops are not only responsible for the massive destruction there but
also committing heinous crimes, like rape as a weapon of war, while ensuring the
Indian control of the disputed territory by hook or crook.

Lest we forget, on
November 2, 1947 India’s
first prime minister Pundit Jawahar Lal Nehru, standing beside Kashmiri leader
Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah, addressed thousands at Lal Chowk of Srinagar
and said “The fate of Kashmir will ultimately
be decided by the people. We have given that pledge and Maharaja (Hari Singh)
had supported it. It is not only a pledge to the people ofKashmirbut to the world. We will not, and cannot back out of it.” Much in
contrast to that and other similar promises of holding a referendum made to the
Kashmiri people the Indian government paid
little attention to the political views of the Kashmiri people. The government
would often dissolve assemblies, arrest elected politicians and impose
president's rule. The government also rigged elections in 1987. The Indian record when it
comes to honoring the pledges she has made to the Kashmiri people and her
treatment of the non-Brahmins inside India, esp. those living in the
north-eastern corner of India, sandwiched between Bangladesh, Myanmar and China
is simply shameful.

So, it is not difficult to understand Indian rep
Mukerji’s deplorable position vis-à-vis Myanmar. Just as India has been able to bury the UN resolutions
on Kashmir all these decades, Mukerji wants to sell the absurd idea that the
discontinuation of annual resolutions on the human rights situation would
encourage reform inside Myanmar.

What reform is Mukerji talking about when some
650,000 people are homeless and forced to live as IDPs inside Myanmar? What
reform when one after another xenophobic, racist and bigotry-ridden bills and
laws are passed in Thein Sein's parliament? What reform when the Rohingyas are
targeted for genocide and elimination? What reform when they are put behind the
bars with long prison term sentences or are sentenced to death when they are
the ones who have been victimized while their tormentors get away scot-free in Myanmar's legal
system? What reform when rape is used as a weapon of war against targeted
minorities in the Rakhine, Chin, Kachin and Shan states? What reform when
racism and bigotry are promoted by the very government agencies that is
supposed to curb its deadly effect? What reform when the eliminationist policy
against the minority Rohingya and other Muslims has become a national project
with deep support enjoyed from President Thein Sein at the top to NLD leader
Suu Kyi and RNDP leader Aye Maung in the middle to NaSaKa to local government agents
and thugs at the bottom? What reform when the fascist groups like 969, led by the
Buddhist terrorist monk Wirathu, dictate the future of Myanmar?

No one is fooled by such a statement from the
Indian rep Mukerji. His condescending remarks say that his government is okay
with everything that is going wrong inside Myanmar and the death and carnage of
the victims are all 'collateral damages' in 'reformed' Myanmar. India is committed to investing billions of
dollars inside Myanmar.
That explains why Mukerji is urging member states to hide Myanmar's crimes under the rug, much like what India has been doing with the Kashmir
crisis. As I have noted before, human rights have long ceased to be a guiding
principle lived by and/or promoted by the government of India, and
surely not under BJP’s rule. With Modi’s ascension to power, it is all too
natural that we see tying knots with a murderous regime that promotes the
Buddhist version of his Hindutvadi fascism!

2015 is the year that ASEAN aims to
become one community of Member States that share a vision and goal to become a
zone of peace and stability.

If ASEAN is genuinely serious about its
declared objective, it must make it crystal clear that Myanmar’s
so-called reforms are not working and need an overhaul of intent and purpose.
It must insist that the
race, family and religious bills recently passed inside the parliament as well
as the absence of swift action to regularize the status of White Card holders (most
of whom are Rohingya people) will be seen as institutionalized
discrimination. It must school Myanmar government that the long-term
stability in the Rakhine state will remain unattainable without comprehensively
addressing the issue of status and citizenship of the Muslim populations --
particularly the plight of those who self-identify and are recognized by the
world community as “Rohingyas” but whom the government calls “Bengalis”;
without these steps, the Myanmar Government will find itself continually
exposed to international criticism. It must insist that the 1982
Citizenship Law violates several international laws and must be repealed. It
must insist that the Rohingya and other stateless minorities (previously
holding the White Cards) who
were born there are given full citizenship rights immediately to live at par
with other dominant ethnic groups and be allowed to vote in the
upcoming constitutional referendum, paving the way for participation in a
general election later this year.

ASEAN
must warn the Myanmar government that its insistence to depicting
the Rohingyas as ‘Bengalis’, which they are not, is tantamount to denying a
group’s self-identification, and thus, qualifies as an international crime of
highest proportion.

ASEAN must inform the Myanmar
leaders that ethnicity is a colonial era invention which has no place in our
time, and that it is divisive, and thus, suicidal or a sure recipe for
disintegration in a multi-racial, -religious and –ethnic state like Myanmar. If Myanmar were to
survive, it must embrace a federal character with regional autonomy, much in
common with original Panglong Agreement signed between Aung Saan and leaders of
other ethnic minorities.

ASEAN must insist that Myanmar’s top leaders – civilian
and military - send a unified message against incitement of hatred and create
and promote an environment of harmony and social cohesion in this fractured
country of many races and religions. It must insist that the Myanmar regime
punish terrorist Buddhist monks like Wirathu who have been behind most of the
genocidal activities directed against Muslim and other religious minorities. It
must insist that Myanmar’s
Buddhist political and religious leaders promote understanding and mutual
respect with others.

ASEAN must insist that Myanmar allows
for unimpeded access by humanitarian agencies to the vulnerable populations especially in the IDP
camps to provide much needed aid in a timely
fashion.

ASEAN must insist that Myanmar adopts a strategy to address her myriad of challenges
failing which the stability and security of the entire region, as already seen
through human trafficking and slave labor camps in places like Thailand and
elsewhere, will be threatened. Such forced or voluntary exodus from Myanmar is destabilizing to the
entire region and must be stopped through tangible measures which address the
root causes of the problem, and not the symptoms.

Without such changes taking
root inside Myanmar,
delivering tangible results, ASEAN’s shared vision and goal to become a zone
of peace and stability will only remain an illusion, and nothing else. The
desired changes won’t happen with either flattering speeches or looking the
other way.

Friday, April 24, 2015

While the majority of Rohingyas of Myanmar today are Muslims, there are Hindu Rohingyas, too. Mahi Ramakrishnan, whose gradma was a Rohingya has made a documentary that tells the tale of the Rohingyas, starting with their escape from ethnic cleansing in their country to the false refuge they found in countries such as Malaysia.Rohingyas of Myanmar mostly live the western state of Arakan (Rakhine) bordering Bangladesh.

You can read about her project by clicking here or read below. Here is another news report made in 2013 about the reasons that Rohingya refugees were forced to flee to Malaysia.

=====================

KUALA LUMPUR, April 24 ― Mahi Ramakrishnan’s connection to the Rohingyas was not just of documentary maker and subject, but one of blood: her grandmother is also a Rohingya.

A journey that was started to discover her grandmother’s roots eventually blossomed into a curiosity to learn about the oppressed Muslim minority in Myanmar (previously Burma).

“It is a love story. My grandmother was a Rohingya. My grandfather was with the British Indian army and met her in Burma, fell in love and eloped with her to Malaysia. My mother was born in Malaysia, a first-generation.

“The thing is, my mother does not know where her mother comes from, which village she was from, except for few photos. It is like the Rohingya community in Malaysia, who were raped, killed and murdered; anyone of them could be my relative,” Mahi said.

This same curiosity led to a nine-year effort to help the refugees from the Muslim minority community here, which then evolved into “Seeds of hatred”, a 30-minute documentary about their plight.

The documentary, which took almost two years to finish, tells the tale of the Rohingyas, starting with their escape from ethnic cleansing in their country to the false refuge they found in countries such as Malaysia.

It also recounts the 2012 Rakhine riots ... that forced a new wave of the Muslim community to flee to neighbouring countries such as Thailand and Malaysia.

The Buddhist-Muslim enmity is also believed to have been brought over to Malaysia, with dozens of murders involving Myanmars here prompting concern that the violence may spread locally.

Malaysia is home to a reported 40,000 Rohingyas, many of whom are barred from seeking employment due to their status as asylum seekers and refugees. This, in turn, makes them vulnerable to exploitation both by the authorities and those willing to employ them illegally.

Although making the documentary was another step in raising awareness on these issues, Mahi said she also wanted it to show other Myanmars the plight of their country’s minority.

“Initially, I only wanted to make a film on Rohingya. But after my trip on 2013 (for research), I was shocked at how divided they are and how a group of marginalised people could not sympathise or empathise with another group of marginalised people,” she said.

As for those seeking asylum in Malaysia, she said she hoped that the government would take faster initiatives to help the Rohingya refugees.

She said one of the few steps was for the government to ratify the United Nations’ (UN) Convention relating to the Status of Refugees (CRSR), which would help define who qualifies as a refugee as well as the rights and protections they would be accorded.

Mahi acknowledged it would take some time for the government to do that but “that does not mean we should not start working towards it”.

“At least the government should take the steps to register the refugees which they promised three years ago, and this would allow them to find work and feed their children,” she said.

In the meantime, she can only hold on to hope that things will get better for the community both in their home country and Malaysia, as she would like the Rohingya to be able to go home with “pride and dignity”.

Thursday, April 23, 2015

Human trafficking is a serious problem in our time when criminals are taking advantage of people who are trying to get out of a country that had seemingly failed them. Many are persecuted people who have been pushed out of their homes. They fancy that they will find a better place than the living hell that they had been living. In our time, no people is worse suffering than the Rohingyas of Myanmar. They are victims of genocidal campaign by Myanmar's Buddhists, esp. those from the Rakhine state, who see their eviction as a way to claim their land and properties. Many Rohingyas are now becoming victims of criminal human traffickers who have no compassion.

Here below is a story of their plight as they are pushed to the see by the racist Buddhists of Myanmar.

====================THE US State Department should assign Myanmar (Burma), Thailand, Malaysia, and Bangladesh a tier-three ranking in its forthcoming Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report in order to encourage more robust and effective action to combat human trafficking, Fortify Rights said today.

In 2014, these countries failed to meet the minimum standards for the elimination of human trafficking as set forth in the US Trafficking Victims Protection Act, Fortify Rights' executive director Matthew Smith said today at a hearing before the US House of Representatives Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, Global Human Rights, and International Organisations.

A 15-page written testimony, submitted to the subcommittee and published by Fortify Rights today, is based on hundreds of interviews conducted by Fortify Rights with witnesses and survivors of abuse and more than a dozen human traffickers.

It focuses on abuses against Rohingya Muslims, who are fleeing state-sponsored violence in Myanmar, and ethnic Kachin and Shan individuals who have been displaced by ongoing armed conflict along the Myanmar-China border.

Fortify Rights said that more than 650,000 Rohingya are displaced in Myanmar and Bangladesh and are at particular risk of being trafficked.

''Myanmar is responsible for setting this regional crisis in motion through its ongoing campaign of persecution against the Rohingya,'' said Matthew Smith.

''Rohingya are being driven into the hands of human traffickers.''

Many Rohingya have fled to neighboring Bangladesh to escape violence, ongoing deprivations in aid, and policies of discrimination in Myanmar.

However, the government of Bangladesh has deliberately denied Rohingya protection and aid, leading tens of thousands to take dangerous and risky boat journeys to Thailand or Malaysia, Fortify Rights said.

Trafficking brokers in Myanmar and Bangladesh often deceive Rohingya into believing that they will be transported to Malaysia, a major destination country for Rohingya.

Instead, they are ferried to international waters and crammed into modern-day slave ships bound for Thailand.

Fortify Rights has documented killings, rape, torture, and deprivations of food and water during the journey at sea.

Once in Thai territory, ''passengers'' are transported to trafficking camps located in remote jungles and on islands where they face torture and other abuses until they can buy their freedom or are sold to the highest bidder.

Rohingya women and girls have been sold into forced marriages and a potential lifetime of sexual and domestic servitude. Men have been sold to fishing boat captains as slave labor.

Although Thailand's unelected military leader General Prayuth Chan-ocha acknowledged that Thai government officials are involved in trafficking, Thailand prosecuted fewer human traffickers in 2014 than it did in 2013.

Fortify Rights says government officials in Myanmar and Thailand have been complicit in a deadly trade in Rohingya asylum seekers that has generated up to $250 million dollars for transnational criminal syndicates since 2012.

Authorities throughout Southeast Asia treat Rohingya asylum seekers as ''illegal migrants'' and subject them to arrest, detention, and informal deportation, putting them at further risk of trafficking.

Fortify Rights' testimony also focused on forced labor and other forms of trafficking of Kachin and Shan civilians displaced along the Myanmar-China border.

More than 170,000 civilians have been displaced by war between the Myanmar Army and various ethnic armies in northern Myanmar since June 2011.

Young women and girls displaced by the war and with few livelihood opportunities are at risk of being abducted or deceived into migrating to China, said Fortify Rights. In China, they have been forced into marriages.

The Myanmar Army has also used forced labor and human shields on the frontlines of the war in Kachin and Shan states - a form of abuse that constitutes human trafficking.

The annual TIP Report is a diplomatic tool of the US government to hold foreign governments accountable for their record on human trafficking.

Countries are ranked on a three-tier system based on the extent to which they meet minimum standards for eliminating trafficking.

Tier-three countries are subject to sanctions at the discretion of the President of the United States. This year's report is due to be released in June.

Thailand and Malaysia currently hold a tier-three TIP report ranking. Bangladesh is tier-two, and Myanmar is tier-two ''watch list.''

''We've seen how TIP rankings get the attention of senior officials and can lead to positive changes in policies and practices,'' Matthew Smith said.

''These patterns of trafficking have gone on for years. Halting them will require significant resources and vigilant, sustained action to ensure justice and protection for survivors.''

How is the life inside IDP (internally displaced person) camps in Akyab (now called Sittwe), the capital city of Arakan (Rakhine) state of Myanmar? Some 140,000 Rohingya now live in segregated camps, which have rightly been described as concentration camp like. Most Rohingya IDPs of Myanmar lost everything that they possessed - homes, business centers, shops, mosques and schools, which were burned down or destroyed in a series of genocidal campaigns by the Rakhine Buddhists plus government security forces, aided by local and central government politicians. The racist Rakhines don't want them to live inside Myanmar, let alone living side by side. Here is a video that shows life inside such an IDP camp.

Wednesday, April 22, 2015

LONDON: Relatives of 24 rubber-plantation workers killed in Malaysia in 1948 by British troops pressed their decades-old demand for a public inquiry in Britain's highest court on Wednesday.

The Dec 12, 1948 incident, dubbed the "Batang Kali massacre", occurred during the so-called Malayan Emergency, when Commonwealth forces fought a communist-inspired revolt in the British colony.

The case has potential ramifications for Britain's duty to investigate historical cases involving its troops, including during the Northern Irish conflict known as The Troubles.

The Supreme Court case had its opening sitting on Wednesday and is being heard by five judges. It is being brought by four appellants against Britain's foreign and defence ministries.

Lawyers for the families argue that Britain has a responsibility to commission an independent inquiry under the European Convention on Human Rights, even though the convention was signed after the incident took place.

The case is also examining whether Britain had any legal responsibility for the soldiers' actions, and if so whether that ceased upon Malaysian independence in 1957.

"I have travelled here to stand before the most senior judges in (the) UK," said 78-year-old Lim Ah Yin, who was 11 years old at the time.

"I want to let them know the struggle and hardship that my beloved mother suffered after the death of my Dad during the massacre."

The ethnic Chinese labourers were killed after British soldiers entered the Batang Kali rubber plantation about 30km north of Kuala Lumpur, rounding up and interrogating villagers.

The communist rebels in what was then called Malaya were predominantly ethnic Chinese.

Chinese had begun arriving in Malaya in the early 20th century to work as labourers.

The British government at the time said that the villagers were suspected insurgents and were shot when they tried to escape, but lawyers for the families argue the men may have been deliberately executed.

Tham Yong, a Batang Kali resident who died in 2010 at the age of 78, previously told AFP she saw at least one of the victims shot in cold blood and that troops pressured another to flee before shooting him in the back.

She denied that the villagers were communists or were aiding the insurgents in any way.

The killings have been referred to as "Britain's My Lai" after the infamous Vietnam War massacre by US troops.

Relatives have fought for years for a public inquiry but have been denied by British courts.

Britain's Ministry of Defence has called the killings a "deeply regrettable incident", but critics have argued against applying European human rights law to military operations.

Uproar

In a letter to London-based newspaper The Times this month, seven former chiefs of defence staff criticised "the creeping legal expansion on to the battlefield", arguing that "war demands different norms and laws than the rest of human activity".

Nevertheless, a lawyer for the families said it was not too late for the law to "demand answers from the state".

"Those killed were British subjects living in a British protected state. They, and their families, have a right to meaningful British justice," lawyer John Halford said.

Brushed aside by Malayan authorities in 1948, the massacre was largely forgotten until 1970 when a British newspaper ran an explosive account of the killings, publishing sworn affidavits by soldiers admitting they had killed in cold blood.

The revelations triggered an uproar in Britain but investigations were never pursued.

The guerrilla war left thousands dead and only formally ended with the signing of a 1989 peace treaty with the Malayan Communist Party. – AFP

Refugees International (RI), Justice for All (USA), the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI), Harvard Global Equality Initiative (HGEI), and International State Crime Initiative Queen Mary University of London (ISCI) and Den norske Burmakomité will be holding a 3-day international conference to discuss the plight of over 1-million Rohingyas of Myanmar (Burma) and explore concrete ways to end their decades-long persecution.

George Soros who escaped Nazi-occupied Hungary sees a parallel between his experience of life under the Nazis in 1944 and the human conditions for the Rohingyas in Western Myanmar, which he witnessed first-hand during a recent visit to the country.

At the conference, iconic leaders from diverse backgrounds including Soros, Nobel Peace laureates Mairead Maguire, Desmond Tutu, and Jose Rose-Horta, and the former prime ministers of Malaysia and Norway - namely Tun Dr Mahathir Mohammad and Kjell Magne Bondevik - will join hands with the representatives of the two generations of Rohingya refugees and activists as well as international human rights researchers and scholars of genocides and mass atrocities. They will push for the end to Myanmar’s policies of discrimination, persecution and oppression.

Tomas Ojea Quinta and Yanghee Lee, former and present UN Special Rapporteurs on the situation of human rights in Myanmar respectively, will also share their expertise with the audiences and other participants.

The first day of the Oslo Conference is open to the public and will be webcast LIVE.

To register, please RSVP by sending an email to OsloConference@yahoo.com . Be sure to include your full name, organizational affiliation (if any), and country of residence.

26 May 2015: The first day of the conference – open to the public - will be held at the Nobel Institute and Voksenaasen conference center on 26 May 2015.

27May 2015: The second day of the conference – by invitation-only – will be devoted to exploring concrete ideas and proposals to help push for the restoration of basic human rights, nationality, and citizenship to the Rohingyas.

28 May 2015: On the third and final day, the conference will host a Burma Forum in central Oslo, a public roundtable with select group of Rohingya leaders, other religious leaders and human rights experts to discuss Myanmar’s rising anti-Muslim hate campaign as well as other contemporary issues of relevance. For more information about the Burma Forum email Norwegian Burma Committee at info@burma.no .

Backgrounder to the Oslo Conference

Rakhine Action Plan

In July 2014, Myanmar government floated a comprehensive plan, known as the “Rakhine Action Plan”, to erase both Rohingya identity and the group’s legal residency in their own ancestral land and sent a 3-member advocacy team – made up of President’s adviser and former academic Dr Kyaw Yin Hlaing, Immigration Minister and ex-Brigadier Khin Yi, and Rakhine Chief Minister and ex-Major General Maung Maung Ohn - to lobby western governments and relevant international organizations to accept Myanmar’s official plan to solve “the Rohingya problem”.

Thein Sein’s government in Myanmar is currently implementing the Rakhine Action Plan. This is evidenced from the further illegalization and disenfranchisement of the vast majority of ethnic Rohingya since March this year, by forcibly confiscating their White Cards, the only documentation that Rohingyas had of their legal, permanent residency. Meanwhile, the international community’s attention is diverted to the fighting along the country’s Sino-Burmese borders between Myanmar army and Kokant Chinese armed resistance organization and its allies, as well as Aung San Suu Kyi’s attempts to push for changes in the military’s 2008 Constitution in time for this year’s planned elections

Myanmar’s Policy of Official Denial and Persecution of the Rohingyas

Following the large scale violence against the Rohingyas in June 2012, Myanmar’s “reformist” government officially proposed two solutions to the Rohingya issue to the visiting head of the United Nations Refugee Agency or UNHCR António Guterres - either the “resettlement” of the Rohingyas to third countries, or placing Rohingya in UN-financed camps on their own ancestral soil in Western Myanmar. In his widely reported address to the Royal Institute of International Affairs (or Chatham House), in London, UK on 17 July 2013, Myanmar President Thein Sein officially denied the existence of Rohingyas as either legal residents or an ethnic group while his government has made consistent attempts to pressure INGOs, foreign missions and the United Nations agencies and officials – including the UN Special Rapporteurs on the human rights situation in Myanmar - to stop recognizing the Rohingya as a distinct ethnic group of Myanmar.

Such statements and policies have been met with stiff opposition from the international community, including the highest level of leaderships such as UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon and US President Barack Obama. In sharp contrast to the international recognition of the Rohingya as an ethnic group, deserving non-discrimination, equal rights, dignity, and the same basic respect as any other indigenous peoples of Myanmar, the country’s Bama or Myanmar Buddhist majority and Rakhine nationalists label the Rohingyas as “illegal Muslim migrants” from the impoverished Bangladesh. As such, Rohingya have popularly been dehumanized and referred to by terms such as “viruses”, “leeches”, (ugly) “ogres”, “dogs” etc.

Sadly, Myanmar’s pro-democracy opposition leaders and human rights organizations including Aung San Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy and other iconic human rights the leaders of the 88 Generation Group also share this anti-Rohingya sentiment. The Myanmar government has, misleadingly, portrayed the plight of Rohingyas as the result of a communal conflict between the predominantly Buddhist Rakhine and the Muslim Rohingya and a supposedly inevitable consequence of the “transition” from dictatorship. Periodically, unsubstantiated claims are made by Myanmar President’s Office attempting to link the Rohingya community to global “Islamic fundamentalism”, and worse still, “terrorism”.

The Worsening Plight of the Rohingyas

The plight of the Rohingyas in Myanmar has worsened since the two bouts of organized attacks on the Rohingya in June and October 2012. In her 9-March-2015 report to the United Nations Human Rights Council, UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar Professor Yanghee Lee stated that Rohingya refugees inside Internally Displaced Persons (or IDP) camps feel they have two (equally risky) options: “to stay and die (in Myanmar) or leave by boat”. According to the UN High Commissioner for the Refugees (UNHCR), approximately 53,000 Rohingyas, including women and children, left Myanmar (and Bangladesh) by boats bound for Thailand and Malaysia in the 11-month period between January and November 2014. International visitors to Rakhine state have described the human conditions for the Rohingyas, both inside and outside IDP camps, as “deplorable”. Even by Myanmar’s official report of Myanmar President’s Rakhine Inquiry Commission, doctor-patient ratios among the Rohingyas in the two majority Rohingya towns in Western Myanmar are 1: 76,000 and 1:83,000 (vis-à-vis 1: 1,000 for the national average). Some local Rakhine groups routinely threaten international humanitarian organizations and attempt to disrupt and stop the delivery of basic humanitarian aid to the Rohingyas.

International Responses

Human rights organizations including Human Rights Watch have assessed Myanmar’s treatment of Rohingyas as ‘crimes against humanity’ and ‘ethnic cleansing’. UN Special Rapporteurs on the situation of human rights in Myanmar including Tomas Quintana Ojea and Yanghee Lee have highlighted the official nature of discrimination and persecution of the Rohingyas that a condones popular racism and violence against Myanmar’s Muslims. The Pacific Rim Law and Policy Association has published a 3-year academic study entitled “The Slow Burning Genocide of Myanmar’s Rohingya” in its peer-reviewed journal “Pacific Rim Law and Policy Journal” (Spring, 2014). Currently, two independent teams of researchers from the International State Crime Research Initiative at Queen Mary University of London, UK and Yale University Human Rights Law Clinic and Fortify Rights are investigating the Rohingya situation using the genocide framework.

Renowned academics, for instance, Harvard’s Amartya Sen have characterized Myanmar’s treatment of Rohingyas as a “slow genocide”. Likewise, at the conference on the Rohingyas at the London School of Economics held in April 2014 the then outgoing UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar Tomas Oeja Quintana observed reportedly “genocidal acts” in the case of Rohingyas.

At this Oslo Conference, global leaders including George Soros and Desmond Tutu will call on the international community, both international investors, European Union and governments with close ties to Myanmar, to help end Myanmar’s Rohingya persecution. They will also call for the restoration of basic human rights, nationality and citizenship to one of the world’s most vulnerable and oppressed peoples who, as a group, do have the fundamental right to self-identity under international human rights law.

Tuesday, April 21, 2015

Before the Battle of
Plassey, Bengal (today’s Bangladesh,
and the states of West Bengal, Bihar, Tripura, Meghalaya,
Assam and Odisha states of India) was a
very rich, prosperous province with enough for everyone to live a very decent
life. As a matter of fact, the inhabitants of Bengal
had a much better standard of living compared to most Europeans living at the
time.

But under the
British rule, the tax burden became simply unbearable rising fivefold (from 10%
in the Nawabi period to 50% of the value of the agricultural product) within a
very short period of time.

The agriculture
sector was ruined by a faulty system, which encouraged cotton, opium poppy and
indigo production over rice cultivation. Moreover, the East India Company (EIC)
cared only about tax/revenue collection and nothing else. They did not do
anything to improve the irrigation system.

To make things
worse, the EIC practiced an unfair trade practice by imposing a
disproportionately heavy duty on goods imported from India
and Bengal to England. Many of its imported products enjoyed
duty-free entry into the local market while the reverse was not true for local
made products, e.g., muslin, into the European market. Indian/Bengali
cotton goods, imported into England,
paid a duty of 10 per cent; silk goods a duty of 20 per cent; Indian woolen
goods, a duty of 30 per cent. Whereas, British cotton and silk goods, conveyed
in British ships to India/Bengal, paid a duty of 3.5 per cent; and British
woolen goods a duty of 2 per cent only.

It is not
difficult to see the impact of such unfair trade practices. In 1815 the cotton
goods exported from India
were of the value of £1.3 million. In 1832 they were less than £100,000. In
1815 the cotton goods imported into India
from England
were of the value of £26,300. In 1832 they were upwards of £400,000. Montgomery
Martin, who had edited the voluminous and valuable statistical account of
Eastern India left by Dr. Francis Buchanan said to a question and answer session in the
British parliament, “We have during the period of a quarter of a century
compelled the Indian territories to receive our manufactures; our woolens, duty
free, our cottons at 24 per cent, and other articles in proportion; while we
have continued during that period to levy almost prohibitory duties, or duties
varying from 10 to 20, 30, 50, 100, 500, and 1000 per cent upon articles, the
produce from our territories. Therefore, the cry that has taken place for free
trade with India, has been a
free trade from this country, not a free trade between India and this country. . . . The
decay and destruction of Surat, of Dacca, of Murshedabad, and
other places where native manufactures have been carried on, is too painful a
fact to dwell upon. I do not consider that it has been in the fair course of
trade; I think it has been the power of the stronger exercised over the
weaker." [Romesh
Dutt,The Economic History of India in the Victorian Age, 3rded., London (1906), vol. 2, p. 112]

To another
set of questions on the subject, Mr. Martin said, “I speak not now of her Dacca muslins and her Cashmere
shawls, but of various articles which she has manufactured in a manner superior
to any part of the world. To reduce her now to an agricultural country would be
an injustice to 1ndia.” [Romesh Dutt,The
Economic History of India in the Victorian Age, 3rded., London (1906), vol. 2, p. 114]

The entire internal
and external trade was monopolized by the EIC. The weavers were forced to weave
cotton yarns beyond their capacity. Even under such savage, brutal, inhuman and
ruthless work environment and tiring and back-breaking workdays, they would be
paid so little that they could ill-afford having a full meal at the end of the
day. Hunger and starvation was their lot. Many cut their own thumbs to avoid
being put to this kind of forced labor, others sold everything including even
their children to escape being punished by the revenue collectors, and many
fled the country. [Romesh Dutt,The Economic History of India under early British Rule, 3rded., London
(1908),pp. 23-27][1]

In 1769 the EIC
directors issued the new directives stipulating that the peasants should be
forced to produce raw material and not finished cotton or silk (resham in
Bangla) products, and that such activities could only be done in company owned
properties (and not at farmer’s cottage). (Ibid., p. 45) Due to unfair trade
practices, soon the entire cotton, muslin and silk industry got ruined. With
one-way of flow of money out to the Great Britain, while nothing spent
for the good of the farmers and the local people, it was only a question of
time when a great famine would ravage the country. That ominous event came in
1770 when a third of the population, nearly ten million people, starved to
death what has been called the Great
Famine of Bengal even though that year the EIC had the highest collection
of revenue ever from the land. (ibid., pp. 52-53)

In the words of historian
Romesh Chunder Dutt, “Early in 1769 high prices gave an indication of an
approaching famine, but the land-tax was more rigorously collected than ever…
It was officially estimated by the members of the Council, after they had made
a circuit through the country to ascertain the effects of the famine, that
about one-third of the population of Bengal,
or about ten millions of people, had died of this famine. And while no
systematic measures were undertaken for the relief of the sufferers perishing
in every village, roadside, and bazaar, the mortality was heightened by the
action of the Company's servants. Their Gomashtas not only monopolised the
grain in order to make high profits from the distress of the people, but they
compelled the cultivators to sell even the seed requisite for the next harvest…
Warren Hastings wrote thus to the court of Directors on the 3rd November 177 2
: " Notwithstanding the loss of at least one-third of the inhabitants of
the province, and the consequent decrease of the cultivation, the nett
collections of the year 1771 exceeded even those of 1768. . . . It was naturally to be expected
that the diminution of the revenue should have kept an equal pace with the
other consequences of so great a calamity. That it did not was owing to its being
violently kept up to its former standard." In the language of modern
Indian administration this violently keeping up the land revenue would be
described as the Recuperative Power of India!” (ibid.)

The EIC also came up
with a new system for revenue collection. It is called the Sunset Lawin which if either a revenue collector
(i.e., zamindar) or a rayat (land holder) had failed to pay the previously
decreed revenue by a certain sunset time, his territory would be auctioned off
to the highest bidder. [Bidders at the auction had been led by the
eagerness of competition to make high offers.] Almost all of these bidders were Hindu
administrative officials, previously employed by Muslim zamindars. Many of them
deliberately faulted upon payment on behalf of the Muslim zamindars so that
later they could bid for the same territory using zamindars’ money. Many of the
new zamindars were Hindu officials employed within the EIC’s government. These
bureaucrats were ideally placed to bid for lands that they knew to be
under-assessed and thereby profitable. In addition, their position allowed them
to quickly acquire wealth through corruption and bribery. They could also
manipulate the system to possess the land that they targeted.

So by 1790 all on a
sudden most of the zamindars or revenue collectors happen to come from the
Hindu community who were mostly absentee landlords that managed their newly
acquired zamindary through local managers. Those new zamindars virtually became
the oppressive hands of the EIC imposing heavy taxes on the peasants. The
situation of Muslims simply worsened after the Permanent Settlement Act,
concluded by Lord Cornwallis in 1793, was enacted. Not only did the Muslim
nobility, including the zamindars lost their properties, even the well-off
farmers started losing their farmland as a result of company policy of high taxes,
high usury rates charged by Hindumahajons(moneylenders) and oppression of the
new Hindu zamindars. Descendants of old houses found their estates pass
into the hands of money-lenders and speculators from Calcutta;
widows and minor proprietors saw their peaceful subjects oppressed by rapacious
agents appointed from Calcutta.

The EIC’s policy
virtually ruined not only the agricultural sector in Bengal
but destroyed its rural cottage industry. Consider, e.g., the case of Muslin –
the finest fabric ever woven in the world, which weighed less than 10 grams per
square yard. Till 1813, Dhaka muslin continued to sell in London with 75 per cent profit and was
cheaper than the local British make fabrics. Alarmed at this competition, the
British imposed 80 per cent duty on the imported Bengali product. But more than
the duty, the EIC was bent on ruining the muslin trade by introducing
machine-made yarn, which was introduced in Dhaka by 1817 at one-fourth the
price of the Dhaka yarn. The Muslin weavers were also paid so little that their
families remained hungry. Another unsavory fact associated with the destruction
of this Dhaka Muslin industry was that the thumbs and index fingers of many
yarn makers were chopped off by the British in order to prevent them from
twisting the finer yarns required for the muslins, which would reduce the
competitive edge that Muslin had enjoyed thus far over its counterpart fabrics
made in Europe. While the machine generated British yarn was uniform in
quality, something which could no longer be maintained by skilled weavers under
inhuman company policy and practices, in 1840, Dr Taylor, a British textile
expert, admitted: "Even in the present day, notwithstanding the great
perfection which the mills have attained, the Dhaka fabrics are unrivalled in
transparency, beauty and delicacy of texture." [In K.R.N. Swamy's work (2002: Chadrigarh Tribune), it is said that the count for the best
variety of Dhaka muslin was 1800 threads per inch, while the lesser varieties had about 1400 threads per inch. It is possible that it should read 1800 filaments per inch and not threads per inch.]

With the destruction of
the Muslin industry, in Dhaka (formerly spelled as Dacca) alone, the population reduced from
150,000 to nearly 30,000. In this regard it is worth mentioning the published
report to a question and answer session in the British parliament (1824). Mr. Trevelyan said, “Indian
cotton manufactures had been to a great extent displaced by English
manufactures. The peculiar kind of silky cotton formerly grown in Bengal, from
which the fine Dacca muslins used to be made, is
hardly ever seen; the population of the town of Dacca has fallen from I 50,000 to 30,000 or
40,000, and the jungle and malaria are fast encroaching upon the town. The only
cotton manufactures which stand their pound in India
are of the very coarse kinds, and the English cotton manufactures are generally
consumed by all above the very poorest throughout India. . . . Dacca, which was the Manchester of India, has
fallen off from very flourishing town to a very poor and small one; the
distress there has heen very great indeed." [Romesh Dutt,The Economic History of India in
the Victorian Age, 3rded.,
London (1906), vol. 2, p. 105][2]

The evils of an oppressive and ever-changing system of land
administration were aggravated by the fact that virtually the whole of the
revenues of the province were drained out of the country, and did not return in
any shape to the people, to fructify their trades, industries, and agriculture.

The extension of British power and influence did not improve
the economic condition of the people, but left behind a dark trail of misery,
insurrections, and famines, in Bengal, Benares, and Oudh.
Bengal and later other parts of India
were a great estate for the profit of the East India Company and its servants,
and they applied the whole forces to make India pay. The good of the people
was made subservient to this primary object of the Company's administration;
the rights of princes and people, of Zemindars and Ryots, were sacrificed to
this dominant idea of the commercial rulers of India. Land revenue was increased
even after the famine of 1770 had swept away one-third of the population of Bengal. The cultivators flying from their homes and
villages or rising in insurrection were driven back by soldiers to their homes
with cruel severity; and a great portion of the money so raised was annually
sent in the shape of Investments to the gratified shareholders in England.

In the words
of Romesh Dutt, “No administrator however gifted, and no administration however
perfect, could prevent national poverty and famines when the whole of their fiscal
policy was to drain the resources of one country for the traders of another.” [Romesh
Dutt,The Economic History
of India under early British Rule, 3rded., London
(1908),pp. 79-80]

“So great an
Economic Drain out of the resources of a land would impoverish the most
prosperous countries on earth; it has reduced India
to a land of famines more frequent, more widespread, and more fatal, than any
known before in the history of India,
or of the world.” (ibid. p. 420)

Post note on Muslin Thread Count:Soon after publication of my article on the controversy surrounding Turkish-Armenian casualty during World War 1, an inquirer inquired about the Dhakai Muslin thread count. I remember in an earlier article on "Bengal under English Rule", I mentioned about Dhakai muslin count to be 1800 per inch. World Clothing and Fashion: An Encyclopedia of History, Culture, and Social InfluenceBy Mary Ellen Snodgrass (2014)also cites the same number. It says: "From the fourth century B.C.E. Bengali women wove wispy muslins as tightly as 1,800 threads per inch. The Greeks preferred fine muslin from Bengal for sheer clothing worn in hot climates, particularly the colonies of Sicily." (p. 1670)K.R.N. Swamy's work (2002: Chadrigarh Tribune) also cited the muslin thread count to be 1800 per inch. In the last few hours, I made some inquiries of my own to verify the authenticity of the thread count. I came across a reliable info from the book "Modern World System and Indian Proto-industrialization: Bengal ..., Volume 1 by Abhay Kumar Singh in which the writer, in page 60 shares the following info on Dhakai muslin for 2 varieties (from the 19th century). The mean filament diameter is mentioned as 0.00066 and 0.00068 inch which gives an estimate of 1471 to 1515 filament counts per inch. The minimum dimensions respectively, are 0.0003 and 0.00038, which give 3333 and 2632 filament counts per inch. I am told that it takes several filaments to make a thread, and as such, the thread counts in these two samples were surely lower than 1800 per inch. It is possible that these Muslin samples cited in Singh's work were not representative of the finest quality of Muslin that KRN Swamy's information was based upon or that of the above cited encyclopedia. Anyway, I shall be glad to be contacted if anyone has such info referring to 1800 thread counts/inch of old Dhakai Muslin.
As to the impact of the decline of muslin industry because of the colonial English policy, historian William Digby estimated that the
population of Dhaka dropped from200,000 to 79,000 between 1787 and 1817; the
export of Dacca muslin to England amounted to 8,000,000 rupees in 1787; in 1817, nil. The fine textile
industry, the livelihoods of thousands, and the self-sufficient village economy (cottage industry) were systematically destroyed.

Monday, April 20, 2015

Here below is heart-breaking story of a Rohingya family shared in the PRI. Persecuted inside Myanmar for their ethnicity and religion, and forced to live in concentration camps as Internally Displaced People (IDPs), many are risking lives to find a better place. Sometimes, they could only send a loved one hoping that he or she will at least survive while they rot and die in the killing fields of Myanmar. But unfortunately, many times they fall prey to human traffickers who are not abusive, but don't mind murdering them, if they are not satisfied. You can also listen to the PRI report by clicking here.================It’s been 47 days since Abdul, a scrawny Rohingya male in his 40s, sent his 14-year-old daughter Dildar away from the Internally Displaced Persons camp where they’d been living in squalid conditions with little food or health care. Dildar left on a fishing boat crammed with other Rohingya Muslims escaping oppression in Rakhine state in the westernmost part of Myanmar, the country formerly called Burma.Until Dildar’s traffickers are paid off, she is being held captive in a secret location, somewhere on the border between Thailand and Malaysia.These traffickers are criminals, out to make a profit. They use lies to lure people onto their boats. Dildar was told her trip would only be a couple hundred US dollars. Now the traffickers are demanding $1500 for her freedom.“Most of the cases hinge on deception that takes place on shore,” says Matthew Smith, the executive director at Fortify Rights — an organization that has documented the persecution of Rohingya for many years.He explains that the Rohingya are told they’ll pay a certain fee to get on a boat to take them to Thailand or Malaysia. But when they get on that boat, they find the conditions are not what they expected — they’re deprived of adequate space, food and water. And the gangs who operate these boats are highly abusive. Sexual violence and murder have been documented, and in some cases Rohingya have committed suicide at sea.But the hardships do not end there. The Rohingya who survive the trip over the Andaman Sea will face further abuses once they get to shore.“Most people get on the boats thinking they are going directly to Malaysia, but what they find is that they are taken on shore in Thailand and clandestinely transported to what we refer to as ‘torture camps,’” Smith says.He says thousands of Rohingya are being held captive by these transnational criminal syndicates. They are beaten and tortured. They’re handed cell phones and told to call anybody they can to raise money to ensure their freedom. At that point, the fee is no longer a few hundred dollars, but up to as much as $2000. And even if the families cannot pay, the traffickers can still make money off the refugees.Smith explains that after several months, if their families are not able to raise the money to free them, they can be sold to work on fishing boats or for others in Thailand and Malaysia. Young women are often sold into forced marriages.Abdul is facing a similar bait and switch. When he calls the trafficker from the refugee camp, he is told: “$1500 and Dildar will be set free.”Abdul works as a trishaw driver, and on a good day he can earn up to $1.50. He explains that he will never be able to earn enough money to raise $1500. So he asks the trafficker, at the other end of the line, if there is any chance that they could marry off his daughter, just to get her out of the jungle camp.”All the other girls here are leaving because their parents are paying,” the trafficker says. ”It’s only Dildar that no one wants to pay for.”Then, the trafficker hands over the phone to Dildar, who at this point hasn’t had any contact with her parents since she left more than six weeks ago.“Papa?” she asks, and Abdul starts crying.”My daughter! I don’t know what to do,” he says.”Can’t you borrow money from someone?” she asks.”From who? I have no relatives that can lend me that kind of money. We are broke,” he says.”Daddy, all the other girls are leaving here,” Dildar says.Before Dildar gets a chance to say goodbye, the trafficker takes back the phone. ”If you manage to raise the money, call me again,” he says.”I will try, God willing,” Abdul says, and again begs the trafficker to try to come up with some kind of solution.This trade in people has become a very lucrative business, and the number of Rohingya refugees fleeing Myanmar has reached record highs over the last few years. Smith’s organization, Fortify Rights, estimates that around 250,000 Rohingya have left the country on boats since 2012.This June, the US State Department will present its annual Trafficking in Persons report — a worldwide ranking of countries’ efforts to combat human trafficking. Smith expects that this year’s report will downgrade Myanmar to the lowest possible ranking.

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About Me

I have a long history of a peaceful activist in my effort towards improving human rights and creating a just and equitable world. I have written extensively in the arena of humanity, global politics, social conscience and human rights since 1980, many of which have appeared in newspapers, magazines, journals and the Internet. I have tirelessly championed the cause of the disadvantaged, the poor and the forgotten here in Americas and abroad. Commenting on my articles, others have said, "His meticulously researched essays and articles combined with real human dimensions on the plight of the displaced peoples of Rohingya in Myanmar, Chechnya, Bosnia, Kosovo and Palestine, and American Muslims in the post-9/11 era have made him a singular important intellectual offering a sane voice with counterpoints to the shrill threats of the oppressors and the powerful. He offers a fresh and insightful perspective on a whole generation of a misunderstood and displaced people with little or no voice of their own." I have authored 13 books, 10 of which are now available through the Amazon.com.